Juliette

The masterpiece of the divine Marquis de Sade.. it should be seen as a kind of dark manifest. Although totally pornographic, in fact, it isn't. It is un- erotic. Also lots of crazy philosophie. Sometimes even humorous. Sadism was named after him. A strange, clinical style without much emotion, except in his defence for libertinism. He clearly did not believe in humanity. And sometimes you feel like he has a point.

What am I to do with myself after I finish reading something so good? Is there anything to compare with this or "the 120 days of sodom"? Everyone should read this. Everyone should be libertine. Everyone should engage in the lubricious. I am so enamored with the philosophy of sade... ahh, what a mind. Here is an example of what is truely crimanal, and that is to deny nature, whatever it's inclinations. Fantastic read! Please comment on this if there is something else I may read to compare with this work or I will be reading this over and over again untill I die. Yes, this book is that good. Thank You.

If you want to see what the basis for the word Sadism is all about, this is the place. Finally available on the net in its complete, unexpurgated evil entirety, with the translation improved by Austryn Wainhouse, as published by Grove Press in the mid 20th century. This is a cornerstone example of the extreme diversity that human imagination can produce, in this case advocating evil behavior in all aspects of life, and supporting its ethos with reams of "philosophy" mostly consisting of examples from remote cultures and convoluted reasoning which always reveals that evil is what Nature (not the nonexistent God) intended the enlightened individual to be, and that evil acts are the most laudable and most exciting to the passions, which are meant to be aroused by hurting others in every way possible. All this is of course interspersed with many, many scenes of physical cruelty and depravity, each more titillatingly disgusting than the last. Juliette is unlike anything else ever published, I think, in it's unrelenting conviction of the goodness of badness.

I wanted to read this book just because I wanted to know what all the hubbub was about. Well... now I know. Am I happy about that? I'm not sure. This book is easy and hard to read all at the same time. I kept having to stop reading for weeks at a time, read other things, then return to this again. I figured being a horror fan and having been around the block (if only as a reader) that anything written in the 1700's would be mild compared to things any of us in the internet generations have seen or read. NOPE. This book is very horrific. The only thing that makes it approachable at all, in my opinion, is that the style of writing the Marquis de Sade uses keeps the reader as an observer always. The reader is never in the mind of the victim. There is so much sex in so many different ways that at times the author admits he wont bother describing the scene any further because it would all be repetitious. I finished the book. I wanted to know what was going to happen. The thing that amazed me most of all was that here was this violent, sexual, horror story and it was all being written by a man in the 1700's and told through a woman. There were lots of times that I was reflecting on what a feminist de Sade was.

1,600 punishing pages devoted to disproving theology, worshing vice and exploring the deepest, darkest corners of the human experience. Plunge yourself into the hell of Sade. A philosophical, amoral tale of corruption, deprivatity, sex, hedonism, crime, hatred, blasphemy, sin and history. As if the man was possessed by demons to taint the hearts and minds of readers and drag them to hell. "Abandonne tout espoir, toi qui entres ici."

The translation makes the book very readable, but the story is long. One has to expect the cruelty, but the philosophy makes the book interesting, and helps one understand the morality of some of the nobility at the time. The methods of cruelty are truly inventive even if imaginative and unlikely.

Juliette is the counterpoint to one of Desade's other novels, Justine. Both are interesting, and mix smut with philosophy. I like them, but i recommend finding a sample to read to see if it's your kind of thing, first.

I've heard of his books forever, but it's really lame. . A lot of talk about nothing.